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The month of September has turned out to be a positive one for the Indian startup ecosystem so far, as venture capital (VC) continues to flow in.

The total VC funding in the third week of September came in at $334 million spread across 21 deals while in the comparable previous week, the amount stood at $165 million.

However, the increase in venture capital funding this week was primarily due to the $229 million raised by Perfios. This has been the trend in startup funding over the past few weeks, where one large deal accounts for a majority of the total funding raised by the startup ecosystem.

The dominant theme of funding activity in 2023 has been that of a large volume of activity in the early stage category of investment but with low value in terms of capital. For example, in the current week, the pre-Series A round of funding saw 12 transactions but only $5 million was raised. On the other hand, in the Series B category, there was just one transaction that raised $30 million.

This trend is likely to be prevalent right through the year as the macroeconomic uncertainty still remains and large deals will not be forthcoming.

However, the silver lining for Indian startups is that venture capital funds such as Artha Group, Kae Capital, and Vertex Ventures continue to raise fresh capital. And, this money will certainly come into the ecosystem.

Key transactions

B2B SaaS fintech startup Perfios raised $229 million in a Series D funding round from private equity investor Kedaara Capital.

Leads Connect, a full-stack agritech startup, raised Rs 500 crore ($60.2 million) from FMCG company BL Agro Industries Ltd.

SaaS logistics startup Kale Logistics raised $30 million in funding led by Creaegis Advisors, a digital and tech-focused private equity fund.